HARO alternatives in 2026: where to find journalist requests now

HARO (Help a Reporter Out) was the cheapest way for a small company to get quoted in the press: a journalist posts a request, you answer it, and if your answer is good you get a quote and usually a link. The Cision-run version, renamed Connectively, closed on December 9, 2024, and the market has been fragmented since. This is a working map of what replaced it, written for B2B teams who want a few editorial placements a quarter without hiring a PR agency.

One caveat before the list: nearly everything written about these platforms is vendor or affiliate content, and pricing and ownership details change often. Treat our descriptions as a starting point and confirm plans and pricing on each platform’s own site before you pay anyone.

What happened to HARO

Cision shut Connectively down at the end of 2024. Featured.com then acquired the HARO brand in April 2025, and the revived service has gone by more than one name since, so you will see conflicting accounts depending on when an article was written. The practical takeaway is that no single successor has the dominance HARO had. Journalist requests are now spread across several platforms and social feeds, which means you either pick two or three and work them consistently, or you pay for a service that watches them for you.

The platforms worth knowing

Source of Sources (SOS). Built by Peter Shankman, the person who originally created HARO. It is free, delivers digests of journalist requests, and is the closest in spirit and volume to the original. Expect a lot of noise, and treat it as a volume channel.

Qwoted. Positioned for higher-tier outlets, with a free tier, and it publicly names national and business outlets among its reporters. Because requests there skew toward established publications, competition for each one is higher. Check current plan limits on their site.

Featured. Offers curated journalist requests with more filtering than the old HARO email blasts. It is also the current owner of the HARO brand, per the sources above.

SourceBottle. Free and relied on heavily by Australian media. Worth it only if Australia or New Zealand is a market you care about.

#JournoRequest on X and Bluesky. Not a platform, but often the fastest channel, since requests appear there before the email digests go out. It rewards speed: the first credible, specific answer wins.

How to choose

You do not need all of them. A sensible setup for a small team:

1. Pick one volume source (SOS) and one quality-biased source (Qwoted or Featured).
2. Set keyword alerts for your three or four real areas of expertise. Do not answer anything outside them; journalists can tell.
3. Assign one person to triage each morning in a fixed 20-minute block. Speed matters more than polish.
4. Log every pitch and outcome in a simple sheet: outlet, topic, time-to-respond, result. After a quarter you will know which source pays off for your niche.

How to pitch when everyone else is using AI

Several of the platform roundups we reviewed note the same problem: AI-generated pitches have flooded these channels, and journalist verification has loosened in places, so reporters are more skeptical than they were. What stands out now:

• Answer the question asked, in the first two sentences. Reporters on deadline copy the sentence they can use. Do not open with your company’s backstory.
• Bring something only you have. A number from your own data, a specific client scenario (anonymized if needed), or a position you will defend. Generic advice is what a chatbot would have sent.
• Give credentials in one line. Name, title, company, and why you are qualified on this exact topic.
• Never pad. Two to four tight paragraphs. If they need more, they will ask.
• Respond fast. On the platforms that publish requests to many people at once, the first strong response often has an edge.
• Be easy to quote. Write one or two sentences that stand alone as a quote, then supply context after.

What these platforms do and don’t do for SEO

A quote in a respected publication earns a brand mention and often a backlink, and brand mentions in earned media are part of how AI engines decide who to cite. We cover the link and citation mechanics in digital PR for SEO. Journalist-request platforms are the reactive, low-cost end of that work: they will not replace a proactive data campaign, and a single placement will not move domain authority. A steady cadence over several quarters does add up.

Be honest about the odds, too. Even when you respond well, most pitches are not used. Treat it like a funnel: many answers, a few quotes, and a smaller number of placements in outlets that matter.

When to stop doing this yourself

Reactive pitching is worth doing in-house while it stays under a few hours a week. It stops being worth it when you want placements in specific tier-one outlets, when you need proactive stories rather than answers to other people’s questions, or when nobody on your team can reliably respond within hours. At that point, the question becomes what a retainer costs and what it buys; see how much PR costs in 2026 and the pitching mechanics in how to get featured in TechCrunch, Forbes, and Inc..

What we run for clients

For clients that want to build earned media on a budget, we start with the reactive layer described above: two request sources, keyword alerts tied to the client’s real expertise, a named spokesperson, and a pitch log. Then we layer proactive work on top as the log shows what the client can credibly speak to. If you want help setting that up, tell us what you’re working on.

FAQ

Is HARO still around? The original Cision-run service ended in December 2024 when Connectively closed. Featured.com acquired the HARO brand in 2025, and reports differ on how it is branded and run today, so check the current site rather than relying on old guides.

What is the best free HARO alternative? Source of Sources is the closest free option to the original in format and volume. Qwoted also has a free tier, but limits change, so confirm on their site.

Do journalist-request quotes help SEO? They can. A published quote often comes with a backlink and a brand mention in an editorial context. One placement rarely changes rankings; consistency over several quarters is what compounds.

How many pitches should I expect to land? There is no reliable public benchmark, and vendor claims are unverified. Track your own pitch log for a quarter and use your own response-to-placement rate.

Can I use AI to write my pitches? Use it for structure and proofreading if you like, but the substance, meaning your data, opinion, and examples, has to be yours. Generic AI-written pitches are exactly what reporters are learning to ignore.

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Related reading:

• Digital PR for SEO in 2026 — the link and AI-citation mechanics of earned media
• How to get featured in TechCrunch, Forbes, and Inc. — proactive pitching mechanics
• How much does PR cost in 2026? — retainer pricing versus doing it yourself
• Thought leadership for B2B — the positions worth pitching